No Dark Valley (59 page)

But it was different from all the times before, she said. Not a sudden blackout, not a pitching forward with great gusto, but a gradual
fizzling
like the air being let out of an inner tube. And right in the middle of crumpling to the floor, she heard this enormous clatter, which must have been the marble tin falling from the shelf, and then felt her foot twisting under her as her full weight came down on it. And as everything faded to blackness, she heard Madison's voice crying, “Mommy!” So Bruce had actually guessed it all wrong. The marbles accompanied the fall rather than actually causing it.

Kimberly tried wiggling her foot a little, breathing in sharply. She winced. Well, no, she admitted to Bruce, she didn't really
remember
when she had last eaten because she had gotten busy working on Madison's scrapbook that day, which was a new hobby one of her friends at the pool had introduced her to last summer, and well, okay, okay, she guessed she
had
sort of lost track of time after Maddy went down for her nap.

But she was trying to be extra careful about eating, really she was because she knew how important it was, especially when you were pregnant, and yes, yes, she had given Madison a peanut butter sandwich and some Fruit Loops at noon—surely he didn't think she'd forget to feed Maddy!—but she had wanted to finish a glitter border in the scrapbook before she ate anything herself, and, well, time got away from her.

The glitter border had led to something else, and something else after that, and . . . no, she absolutely
never ever
would let it happen again, she promised. After all, it wasn't like this happened every day—just think of how long it had been since the last time. He didn't have to look at her that way, like she was one of his junior high students. And he needn't think he had to start monitoring her food intake and checking up on her all the time. She had only forgotten this
one
time. She wasn't a child, for heaven's sake. And by the way, where was Madison anyway?

Her mouth dropped open. Surely he was kidding. Bruce had actually left Maddy with that snob next door? Well, he needed to leave
right now
and go get her. What had he been thinking of?

Madison was fine, he told her. He had been hit with a really strong feeling that he could trust Celia, and Kimberly knew, didn't she, how unerring his instincts about women usually were?

You mean like that girl in Montgomery a few years ago? Kimberly asked, to which he replied without hesitation, yes, like that girl in Montgomery, the one who had raised huge red flags in his mind soon after he had met her, the one he had tried to ease away from repeatedly, who not only ignored his first early hints but later his outright declarations that no, he did not now nor would he ever love her, the one who had
lied
to him.

Bruce called Patsy Stewart to give her a report on Kimberly and to ask her to tell Celia. But he wouldn't leave the hospital until Kimberly was transferred to a regular room. When he finally said good-bye, Kimberly squeezed his hand and said, “I'm sorry, Bruce. That was mean of me to bring that up. I don't deserve you.”

He leaned down and kissed her on the forehead. “You're right, kid,” he said. “I think I'll tell them to keep you here a week or two and poke you with needles every couple of hours.”

Twenty minutes later Bruce found himself doing something he had promised himself never to do again: He was standing at Celia's door, his hand raised to knock. Her porch light was on, which he took to mean she was expecting him, probably eagerly. Not to see him, of course, but to get rid of Madison.

He stood there for several long moments listening for sounds coming from inside but hearing nothing. So at least Maddy must be behaving herself. Hopefully she was already asleep, since it was well past her bedtime, or what should be her bedtime. Kimberly was bad about keeping her up too late, letting her watch cartoon tapes and feeding her snacks at all hours.

In Bruce's opinion a child should be in bed at least by eight o'clock, though he had developed this opinion only in the past couple of years. Before Maddy, he had never given a passing thought to kids and their bedtimes, except for when he was a kid himself, of course. Back then he had had a vast repertoire of tricks to delay his own bedtime and had even succeeded with a number of them because his mother had been such a soft touch.

He knocked, waited a few seconds, then knocked again a little louder. He didn't want to use the doorbell, as it might wake Madison. He heard a light bump from inside and soon the sound of someone fumbling with the deadbolt. He smiled and waved apologetically at the little viewer hole in case she was checking to see who it was. The door swung open, and Celia unlocked the screen, then pushed it open to let him in.

She was still wearing the jeans and flannel shirt. She put a finger to her lips and pointed to the couch where Madison lay sleeping, a patchwork quilt folded over her. The television was on but turned down so low he could barely hear it. The news was on, and the anchorman was earnestly delivering his scripted speech. The look on his face was quite pleasant, but you couldn't tell anything by that. These news people had a way of reporting the most horrendous events with the same serene expression as when they told about a community wiener roast or the annual Christmas parade.

Bruce had planned simply to pick Madison up and go home immediately, but somehow he found himself sitting next to the sofa in a large chair upholstered in a cream-and-rose print. And the next minute Celia was handing him a mug of something hot, which she announced as mulled cider, something he didn't usually even like. And there was a saucer of sugar cookies on the glass-topped table next to him. Were those for him? he wondered. Had she offered him one? Suddenly he thought of the beef stroganoff Kimberly had been planning to feed him for supper. Cider and cookies were a mighty poor substitute for a plate of real food, but not wanting to seem ungrateful, he took a small sip from his mug, at which time he felt like he had put a blowtorch to his tongue.

“It's hot,” she said in a tone of voice that made Bruce think maybe she had already warned him.

“No kidding,” he said. He lowered his head and blew into the cup until his eyes quit watering.

“Sorry.”

He shook his head. “Oh, no problem.” He shrugged. “I didn't need those taste buds anyway.” He pointed to the tip of his tongue. “Those are the sweet ones, you know, so maybe now I won't be so tempted every time I pass Krispy Kreme.” That was dumb, he thought. What happened to him every time he opened his mouth in front of this woman? He used to be so good at clever repartee.

“So she's okay?” she said.

“Who?”

“Your sister.” There it was again, the faintest hint of extra emphasis on the word
sister
. But maybe this time it was her way of saying, “Who else would I be asking about, nincompoop?”

“Oh, Kimberly—yes, as a matter of fact, she is. Just a sprained ankle is all.”

Madison stirred a little under the quilt and stuck two fingers in her mouth. Bruce saw Celia stiffen and glance nervously at her. He could imagine what kind of mother she would make—the fretful, overly solicitous type, the kind who would draw up a schedule and stick to it relentlessly. Kimberly wasn't perfect, but at least she gave Madison plenty of room to breathe.

Bruce noticed something he hadn't seen earlier. A basket with several plastic tubes of tennis balls in it was sitting beside the couch.

Celia must have seen him looking at it. “We tried playing a little game.”

“A game?”

“She caught on pretty fast,” she said. “It was sort of like bowling. I set up the empty cans and showed her how to roll the ball to try to knock them down.”

Bruce could hardly believe it. So much for his unerring instincts about women. So Celia had actually let her hair down enough to play a game with Madison—an indoor game with balls, no less, balls that could hit things and break them and make a mess on the floor.

He couldn't think of anything to say, so he picked up a sugar cookie off the saucer and bit into it. It was the soft homemade kind, the kind his mother used to make at Christmastime, shaped like stars and Christmas trees and sprinkled with red and green sugar crystals. This one was round, though, with a hint of lemon and sprinkled with regular white sugar. Before he knew it, he had finished the whole thing. He took another one. “These are good,” he said. He could have popped it in his mouth whole, but he forced himself to take several bites and chew slowly. His granola bar at the hospital had long since worn off.

He took another cautious sip of his hot cider. It had an exceedingly tangy, almost fermented taste. A picture of rotting apple peels on top of a steaming compost pile rose before him. The drink was a little cooler now at least, but his mouth still burned from the earlier taste. He pressed the tip of his tongue against his teeth and knew he would be reminded of tonight for days to come until the soreness faded.

“I had the weirdest sensation on the way to the hospital,” he said suddenly, realizing he should try to think this out before launching into it. Too late now. “As if I'd done it all before, or like I had expected all along that I'd be doing it eventually. Like it was inevitable.” Celia looked at him, her chin lifted, her eyes studying him closely. “But at the same time,” he continued, “something was telling me it was going to be all right. Even when I started praying, it was like I heard an actual voice in my head, saying, ‘It's okay. She's not going to lose the baby.' I can't explain it. It was like something I was reading in a book. Like it was real and unreal at the same time.” He made a face. “I know it must sound dumb.”

Celia shook her head. “No, not really,” she answered slowly. “I think I know what you mean.”

“You do?” Bruce said. “Do you ever . . . ? No, never mind.”

“What?”

“Nothing.” He took another sip of his cider, then another. This stuff was potent. He hoped he could walk straight after he stood up from the chair.

“I've had the same feeling,” Celia said. “That feeling of almost
knowing
something's going to happen. You're surprised but not
really
surprised.”

Neither of them spoke for a long moment. Madison made a little sucking noise on her fingers, then stopped. Looking into his mug, Bruce saw that half of his cider was gone. He set it down gently on top of an
American Art Review
magazine lying on the glass-topped table. “Well, I guess I need to . . .” he started, at the same instant Celia said, “The other night I . . .”

They both stopped. For a second Bruce couldn't think of a thing to say. He used to be so good at tossing off witticisms to cover up small embarrassments, but here he sat, his mind as blank as a concrete wall.

“You go first,” he said. “The other night you what? Washed the windows? Made soup? Did your laundry? Baked these cookies?” Then realizing he must sound like some kind of male chauvinist who thought all women spent every waking hour at home doing domestic things, he added, “Watched a movie? Read a book? Played—” He caught himself before he said “the clarinet.” What if she thought he hung around her apartment eavesdropping? He cleared his throat. “Played tennis?” he finished. Okay, so now she knew he must have seen her in her tennis skirt, carrying her bag to and from her car.

She was staring at his mouth with a slightly pained expression, maybe wondering what other absurd things were going to come out of it. She shook her head. “Well, no, none of that is what I was going to say. It wasn't important anyway.” She glanced at a clock on the glass-topped table—a sturdy modern-looking model made of brushed pewter, with large black hands and numbers.

Bruce stood up, forgetting the napkin in his lap, which now fluttered to the floor. He picked it up and wadded it into a ball, then aimed it at the little wicker trash basket beside the television. Of course he missed—and the second before he let it go, he had
known
he would miss, just like Celia was saying a minute ago. Another skill he had lost around women. He used to be able to sink a paper wad in a trash can from the other side of a room. Maybe he should tell her about the time he had scored thirty points in a basketball game in high school, but he decided she would neither care nor believe him.

Celia was already bending down to retrieve the wadded napkin when the whole scene before him suddenly struck Bruce with a force he couldn't remember since the grand moment of illumination in his mother's attic four years ago. It must have been the combined effect of the cookies and the mulled cider and the pleasant decor of Celia's apartment, so different from his own stark quarters next door, and probably also the sight of Celia herself, so small and nice to look at, and even Madison sleeping peacefully on the couch. Add to all that the fact that he was tired, having been at the hospital a good part of the night.

A home and a family of my own—what a nice thing that would be
. This was the thought that leapt into his mind at that instant, a host of others crowding in behind it. Time was running short. He was almost forty, past his prime. Half of his life was already behind him. What used to give him such a suffocating feeling—the idea of sticking with one woman for good—now made him think of the high, clear ting of a silver fork tapped against fine crystal. And children, little bright-eyed Healeys splashing in bathtubs and riding tricycles and playing in mud—how could he live the rest of his life without them? He wanted to drive around in a van with one of those bumper stickers that said
I'm the proud parent of a terrific kid
.

It was astonishing how often he was reminded these days of life's brevity. Every day at school he thought of it. You couldn't teach middle school science without a clear understanding of the vulnerability of living organisms. You couldn't look through a microscope without thinking,
Well, these little guys won't be around for very long
. He thought about all the depressing material in the upcoming chapter, the one they would start this very week—all about disruptions in the rhythms of ecosystems, decomposition, the food chain, overpopulation, air pollutants, hazardous wastes. Often he would look into the faces of his students and wonder which of them would die first, which diseases or accidents would claim their lives.